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1906 Conservative Party General Election Manifesto

Arther Balfour's Election Address

The party with which I am connected, and the Government of which I was a member, after being
in power for ten years, has been replaced by the late Opposition. The task the constituencies
have now to perform is to choose between them. It should not be a difficult one. So far as
we are concerned your information is ample; our legislation, our foreign policy, our Colonial
policy, are before you, and there are such as need cause neither shame in us nor regret in
you. The same principles on which we have based our actions in the past will serve as their
foundation in the future, and in the future as in the paast they will promote peace among
nations, closer union between different portions of the Empire, and social legislation
at home which is not likely to be less beneficient to the community because it is mindful
of individual rights.

Your information about the new Government and its supporters is no doubt more limited. You
know them chiefly as critics, and it must be owned that their criticism has been singularly
unscrupulous - as in the case of Chinese labour - and sometimes singularly perverse - as in
the case of the Prime Minister's famour attack on the humanity of our Army. But, after all,
we are not restricted in our survey to the performances of his Majesty's present advisers
while they were in Opposition. Some of the most distinguished of them have held office before,
and as they boast an unrepentant fidelity to the views which they entertained in 1892, we
must anticipate a return to the policy they then attempted, but were fortunately too feeble
to accomplish. There are many things still obscure in the long catalogue of revolutionary
changes advocated by the new Ministers, but some things are plain enough - Home Rule,
disestablishment, the destruction of voluntary schools, and the spoliation of the
license-holder have lost none of their ancient charm in the eyes of Radical law-makers, and
to the troupe of old acquaintances is now added a procession of shadowy suggestions respecting
which we hardly yet know enough to say whether they are dangerous or merely useless.

On one subject only does change, nay, even to hint of change, seem to them abhorrent. With a
light heart the Radical leaders are prepared to destroy the Union, to uproot an ancient
Church, to banish denominational religion, or even all religion, from the elementary schools.
But one thing is sacred, and that is the fiscal practice of this country. The conditions of
international trade may alter, the relation of Britain to other industrial communities
may be utterly transformed, her Colonies may press for closer commercial union with the mother
country - it matters not at all. The fiscal creed of the new Radical is that what was good
60 years ago must not only be good now, but must for ever be incapable of improvement. I take
a more conservative view. I believe in the wisdom of adapting our policy, in fiscal matters
as in all matters, to the changing conditions of a changing world, and I hold that the time
has come when such adapting is urgently required. Should you return the Unionist party to
power, it is to the reform of our fiscal system that its attention ought first to be directed -
a task worthy of the efforts of a great party.

To the foreign policy of the new Government we might seem justified in looking with more
satisfaction than to its legislative projects, for apparently it is designed to be a
continuation of our own. But, confident as I am of the capacity and patriotism of Sir
Edward Grey, I doubt the successor his imitation. A foreign policy which is to be pacific,
honourable, and consistent, requires not merely a Foreign Minister of ability, but a Foreign
Minister who has two conditions in his favour. The first is a strong defensive naval
and military force, without which diplomacy in time of serious stress degenerates either into
buff, or into appeals for mercy, or into a haggle over blackmail. Whether this condition will
be fulfilled some recent utterances of the Prime Minister leave me in anxious doubt. But there
is a second and not less important condition of success whcih the new Foreign Secretary
cannot hope to secure, and that is the support of a united Cabinet dependent on a United
Party. On their legislation the Ministers may have come to some working agreement - time will
show - but no agreement on the unforeseen problems of international statesmanship is possible
among men who will look at them when they arise from such different points of view as those of
the "Little Englander" and "Liberal Imperialists&quot. But the differences in
the Cabinet, serious as in this connexion they cannot fail to be, are nothing compared with the
differences which divide the confederation of parties on which the Cabinet depends. In
Imperial matters the gulf which divides, say, Mr Perks from Mr Redmond is immeasurable; no
formula can conceal it, no compromise can bridge it; and if the new Government survive the
general election, and if during their term of office their country becomes involved in
international difficulties, the Foreign Secretary may find himself labouring under conditions
which are favourable neither to his own fame nor his country's welfare.

Such, in brief outline, are the public grounds on which I venture to recommend my candidature
to your favourable consideration. Other grounds there are - ancient friendship, mutual
confidence, long habits of loyal co-operation - to which I might make appearl; but if the
personal side of the question is to be touched at all, I have, perhaps no right to do more than
ask whether, during the 20 years in which you have extended to me an ungrudging support, I have
not done political service which may make me not unworthy of your continued confidence.

Archive of Conservative Party Manifestos

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Party should go to
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